An Angel Came Down
by GraceSong
Summary: An angel is given a mission from God, to find out the worth of humanity since the original Christmas Eve. Castiel is this angel, and his quest will take him to Illinois and Massachusetts, and to the doorstep of two brothers holed up in a motel over Christmas, with only the desk clerk for company. A fluffy Christmas fic with destiel and Sam/OC if you squint, mostly just Xmas fluff


**Hello readers. This short festive tale is based on the songs An Angel Came Down and An Angel Returned by the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. I heard them and couldn't help but thing of Cas, and so this was born.**

 **It is set in 2006, so season 2 for the boys. I've tried to make it is as canonical as possible as a result.**

 **Disclaimer: Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters aside from my own OC. The rights of the other characters belong to Supernatural and its affiliates.**

 **Enjoy and Happy Holidays to everyone out there!**

An Angel Came Down

Massachusetts was silent under the drizzle of the winter fog. Wisps of it caught on chimneys and clogged leaf barren trees with its whispers. Beneath its billowed-sheet covering, the reds, greens and yellows of Christmas light tendrils peaked out in all their battery operated splendour. The streets were silent: a barrage of white the day before and the threat of more to come convincing anyone not already at home for the holidays to wait it out where they were.

Above them, just below the taunting lights of the stars beyond the mist, Castiel paused in his flight and watched the serene streets flicker beneath wavering street lights.

Earth fascinated him. Obviously he never voiced his fascination for fear of mockery from others in his garrison – Uriel in particular who was sharp with his tongue and quick at which speed he delivered his spitting insults. But nonetheless when he was given his Mission and it involved walking amidst the humans, Castiel was quietly elated.

Every angel received a Mission. It was their chance to prove themselves to their superiors and to their Father, and it also determined whether they were to work their way up the ranks in their garrison or be given their own to lead. Usually it was the commander of the Garrison's job to issue the Missions for the youngest angels, and Castiel had been dreading whatever challenge Anael decreed to him. She was a fair leader, but also a firm one and the whispers amongst the garrison of previous Missions given by her didn't relay much hope to the younger angels.

Nevertheless, the camaraderie between Castiel and his leader would, he had hoped, at least allow for his Mission to be achievable if not enjoyable. When Uriel had received his – to observe a warzone on Earth and report back as to how humanity's imperfections had caused it – Castiel had been jealous that his brother had gotten to watch humanity, but nonetheless a little relieved that he wouldn't have to be the one to explain more of humanity's misgivings. He feared he was too sympathetic to their plight, however inwardly, to do that task well.

When he had received his own, however, Castiel could feel nothing but shock. His task was vague, and many of his brothers and sisters breathed a sigh of relief that their Missions were not nearly as hard. But that was not what had shocked Castiel. What had made him pause; nay freeze as he received it was who it had come from.

Anael had been discussing something with his direct superior, Zachariah, while behind them Bartholomew and Hester awaited their own Missions. The rest of his garrison were preening or talking as they endlessly prepared for the next battle, the next threat to Heaven. As he had watched this scene of bland familiarity, Castiel had felt a rush of pure elation through his very core and his wings had tingled as wind whipped through them. He had looked upwards, his face being bathed in a light far brighter than his grace could ever emit. Other angels had turned towards him, their wings arching at first in fear, and then in curiosity. Castiel did not see them. He was listening. He was listening to God.

The Mission was from his Father, directly. And as soon as the light, His wondrous, soul filling light had left him, the young angel had been crowded by his garrison and other angels alike, all wanting to know what He had said and what had to be done.

Castiel did not tell him, partly as his whole being was still bathing in the remnants of His glory and to talk would be to let the feeling fade away, but mostly because He had told him not to say. This Mission was sacred, and only Castiel could know of it.

So he had looked at Anael, wings bowed ever so slightly in show of submission to his superior, as he demanded to be allowed to leave. The strong words had felt odd to say, so used was he to being commanded rather than doing the commanding. Anael had nodded - her own curiosity clear but having to hide under the façade of a leader. Castiel had nodded back in thanks briefly, before spreading his wings and leaving Heaven and the multitude of questions from his brothers and sisters in his wake.

Now though, as he watched the lights start to dim as it got nearer to midnight, Castiel was faltering. The purpose he had felt to strongly upon leaving Heaven had dwindled as doubt started to set in. He had already surveyed most of the world, and had not been able to find what God had asked for.

His Mission was to find something impossible - something that no one could touch, but that angels could hold. This object, whatever it was, would prove to the angels to worth of humanity, and to God would show the worth of everything His children had done since His son had been born on the same night many eons ago. In short, it was an impossible Mission, and despite God's grace still fuelling his actions, Castiel was beginning to fear that he would not be able to complete his task.

This emotion, this very human emotion, was boiling into something the young angel feared would become evident to his garrison should he return now, when he heard it.

It came from far below him, which after a few seconds of pin pointing rooted the sound to a motel on the outskirts of a town the angel did not care to learn the name of.

The first few bars of a Christmas carol drifted up to him, crackly and warbled courtesy of a poorly made radio. As the tune started, drearily reciting words of a holy night and total peace, the voice that had dragged Castiel from his thoughts arrived at his ears with clarity.

"Alright Sammy, you'd better wake up Miss Desk Clerk here."

Castiel was already reeling in the sky above as another voice replied.

"I'm covered in blood Dean; you really want to explain that to the police when she calls them?"

Castiel didn't need to hear anymore. He had found what he was looking for, and now he needed a vessel.

 **xXx**

"Fine, I'll wake her up. Merry Christmas to you too, Sam," Dean muttered underneath his breath as he strode towards the welcome desk. The motel was shabby, the Christmas decorations clearly having seen better days. The desk clerk in question was slumped over, her cheek against the hard surface while her arms cradled the keyboard in a tangle of limbs. The ending notes of 'Silent Night' did nothing to wake her, as neither did the starting jingles of the next Christmas song apparently on a loop.

What did wake her however was Dean Winchester dropping his bag on the floor in front of the desk and shaking her.

"Waah," she bolted upright, looking around deliriously as she blinked the sleep out of her eyes. As the two men in front of her came into focus, she hastily brushed the mussed up hair from her face and sighed.

"Hello and welcome to the Pleasant Rest Motel, how may I help you on this snowy 2006 Christmas Eve?"

As she recited the near scripted greeting, she took in the two men in more detail. The one that had shaken her awake was tall, with dark hair and eyes that were a shade of green that was giving the Christmas lights tacked to the desk a run for their money in their brightness. Behind him, and standing awkwardly with one hand pressed tightly over his other arm, was an even taller man, younger and with longer brown hair. Both were wearing a plethora of layers and looks of tiredness.

Wordlessly, the young woman reached behind her and snagged one of many room keys from its hook. The motel was not busy. At all. In fact, there was no one staying over the festive period in the middle of nowhere Massachusetts, but her boss had told her to hide some of the keys in the drawer beneath the desk so it at least looked relatively busy.

"Twin room, yeah?" She handed the key to the green eyed man with a small smile, and then turned back to the shelf with towels on behind her so she could hide her yawn.

"It might be a bit cold in your room, so I can give you extra blankets. We weren't expecting this much snow, I'm actually quite surprised you made it through as they closed the roads not that long ago. You can pay in the morning or whenever you want to check out, I'll be here for the next couple of days and then someone else will take over my shift. If you need anything don't hesitate to call – Holy shit!"

She had turned back around to find the taller man peeling off his coat, and he was literally peeling it because one sleeve was stubbornly sticking to his shirt, adhered with blood.

"You're bleeding," she managed to stammer out.

"Uh," The other man, the older one, stepped in front of her line of sight and took the towels and blankets from her arms. "We've got it covered."

"You're bleeding too," The desk clerk looked at the towels which were now being turned pink by the blood trickling down his sleeve.

"Shit," the man tilted the towels to get a better look at his arm, and the gash evident even through his leather coat. "That bitch got me too."

The other man frowned even more at this, but his frown turned to a grimace as he put pressure back on his own wound.

It had been a malevolent spirit with a hatred for Christmas carols. Add in a montage of being pushed through windows and thrown about like a ragdoll, and that about surmised the Winchesters' evening. They'd got the bitch before she'd hurt anyone else – the body count of unfortunate carol singers more than enough for one festive season. But they'd also gotten beat up and then bogged down in a snowstorm which made their smooth getaway a whole lot bumpier. That led them to here, in a motel dripping blood over the entrance carpet and probably counting down the seconds until the girl on the desk called the cops on them.

The girl in front of them took in a ragged breath, letting it out slowly as she clearly tried to calm herself down. The brothers waited with apprehension. Usually by now Sam would have stepped in with whatever mushy stuff he said that always managed to calm down the girls, but seeing as he was currently the one dripping the most blood, Dean had to take the lead.

"Uh…it's alright…" he juggled the towels so the hand he patted the girl's shoulder with wasn't the bloody one. The girl looked up at him, her face blank, her eyes steely.

"I know it is," she looked behind Dean towards Sam. "Can I borrow your coat?"

"Uh, yeah, sure." The younger Winchester handed it to her with some trepidation. With a murmured 'Be right back' she disappeared into a back room.

Unsure of what else to do, the Winchesters waited in the motel lobby. There was a sudden crash of glass breaking, and then the desk clerk was coming back clutching a first aid kit, a selection of small white packets and a bottle of whisky. She deposited all of them on the desk and began to unwrap Sam's coat from around her fist. Bits of glass fell out as she shook it and then handed it back.

"What kind of idiot puts the first aid kit behind a locked glass door?" She scooped up more towels from behind the desk and balanced the rest of the items on top of them before stepping out from behind the desk. "Actually that's not a rhetorical question. The answer is my boss. Your room's this way."

She set off down the corridor, the boys following behind her with bemused expressions.

A few minutes later and the brothers were spread out in the room, towels and bandages piled up on the bed. The desk clerk leant against the doorway, watching as the older one moved to the bathroom with a washcloth in hand, and the younger reached for the whisky she'd set down on the bedside table.

"Do you want some," He gestured with the bottle to the plastic glasses the motel supplied for gargling purposes.

"What time is it?" The girl ventured further into the room, politely ignoring the hisses of pain coming from the bathroom.

The man looked at his watch, gasping as he did so as a little more blood made its way from the gash on his bicep.

"Just past midnight."

"Seeing as I'm legal now, may as well," she moved to sit cross-legged on the bed opposite from the man.

He quirked an eyebrow at her as he poured the drink. "You were born on Christmas Day?"

She took the cup from him with a small smile, "Yeah."

She took a small sip, recoiled slightly at the taste and then set her cup back down.

"I'm Merry by the way; my nametag has been deceiving you."

"Merry," Sam paused in taking a swig from the bottle to look directly at the 21 year old in front of him. "As in…"

"As in Merry Christmas yes," the look on Merry's face was one of tired annoyance. "My parents just loved themed names."

Sam couldn't help the chuckle that escaped him, but was pleased to see Merry joining in.

"I'm Sam. Sam Winchester," he gestured to the bathroom, "That's my brother Dean."

"Hey Dean," Merry called out, and received a grunt in reply. She shared another smile with Sam.

As the bathroom door opened, Merry jumped off the bed and quickly downed the rest of her whiskey.

"I'll leave you to your evening Sam, Dean." The older brother nodded in thanks, quelling the slight protest from the younger. Merry continued, oblivious. "The first aid kit should be pretty full, and there is plenty of thread in the tiny sewing packets if you need it."

She reached the door and set her empty cup on the dresser beside it. "I'll be at the desk if you need anything."

As the door shut in front of her, Merry turned back towards the front desk amidst a barrage of self-inflicted questions.

Number one on that list was: What the hell were you thinking accepting a drink from a customer? Shortly followed by: Why was said customer bleeding all over the sheets you'll have to change tomorrow?

With a sigh to silence the questions in her mind, she set off back down the corridor to the desk.

 **xXx**

Jimmy Novak had been driving back from Midnight Mass when he had heard it. His wife and daughter had gone to the nativity service earlier on Christmas Eve, but he had been working and so decided to attend the Midnight Mass alone. He was already planning what he had to do when he got home. Amelia would still be up, creeping around the house no doubt so that Claire wasn't woken up. They hadn't decided whether they'd do a snow footprint on the doorstep or just a note written with handwriting that Claire hopefully wouldn't recognise. He was just musing how best to disguise his scribble scrawl font for something a lot more Santa Claus-y when the light had bathed his car in brightness and he had had to hit the brakes.

"But it's Christmas," He murmured as he listened to the voice coming from above.

"Just for a few hours?"

"How can I know you're telling the truth?"

"Yes, yes ok. I accept, but only until 2am."

The light vanished .Later, someone would skid down the slope of the roadside verge and would see their enquiry about the health of the person in the car on the way back from Midnight Mass met with a perfectly healthy, if a little dazed AM radio ad space seller. For now though, the car was empty, and Jimmy was with Castiel.

 **xXx**

Massachusetts was still silent, though the drizzle had come to a standstill, leaving the silent streets bare under a blanket of snow. Inside the Pleasant Rest motel, the desk clerk was resting with her head in her hands, hoping under her breath that the brothers in room 24 needed something else that evening/morning.

Castiel hadn't taken a vessel before. It was constricting and confusing and so, so small. As he landed in the lobby of the hotel, he stretched his wings out in a last ditch attempt to regain some sense of balance in his new form.

"I should not have had that whisky," A voice said from the front desk.

Castiel spun on his heels, wobbling slightly as he struggled to keep straight. The desk clerk was looking at him, head tilted in confusion and eyes bright despite the early hours.

In a few steps, Castiel was in front of her, fingers outstretched in a natural feeling gesture as he collected his Grace to pool near her temple. He didn't want to kill her, so he would have to be careful with his meddling to ensure she was only knocked unconscious.

Merry had no time to back up, but her mind was going a mile a minute trying to remember where and why she knew what this man in front of her was. As it clicked, one small hand shot up to grab the arm of the blue eyed creature reaching towards her.

" _Ol bolape a noco de elo,"_ She managed barely a whisper as she forced herself to meet the creature's eyes directly.

Castiel recoiled in a mixture of shock and confusion. I am God's servant. That was what the human in front of him had said, in enochian. It was badly pronounced and sounded wrong coming from the mouth of a human, but that was what she had said nonetheless.

He looked back up, expecting the girl to still be in front of him, but instead she was retreating towards a doorway behind the desk. She looked terrified, and he could hear her heart beating erratically if he disregarded the hearing of his vessel and instead relied on his own.

"Do not be afraid, I am sent from God," He advanced towards her, around the desk and would have reached to her again had she not brandished a shard of glass in front of her instead.

"I don't believe you, all sorts of crazy people have come through tonight and its Christmas so I really don't want to die yet," She backed up again, until she hit the wall and decided instead to shrink into herself.

"Why did my Grandma have to be right about this," She whimpered as Castiel approached her again.

"I promise I will not harm you," The angel reached for her and before she could snatch her hand away the glass was gone from her grip and discarded to the floor. The man's hands gripped her palm between them, and the desk clerk watched with wide eyes as the hand placed over the gash the glass had caused was lit by a bright blue light.

Merry gasped and felt her knees go week. For a second they did buckle, but the man, the creature in front of her was still holding her arms and kept her from falling.

"You're really one of them," She gasped. "My Grandma said they would come one day but I never believed…"

Castiel released her and stepped back a few paces. He remained still as the desk clerk reached one hand up and touched his cheek.

When she pulled her hand back, a flush on her cheeks hinting at her embarrassment, he cleared his throat and looked down at her.

"I am searching for someone," He began, before faltering as he tried to find the words to explain what it was he was looking for, when all he knew was that the voice he had heard was it somehow.

"Is it your Mission?" The desk clerk flexed her healed hand as she walked back towards the desk. Only the slight quivering of her hands gave away her continued anxiety.

Again Castiel paused.

"How do you know of such things?" His voice still sounded odd, even to him. It was deep and gravelly.

"My Grandma always told me stories. I thought they were just silly tales she'd made up, but you are here in front of me, just like she said. I always did like the story of the Christmas Angel the most…" She trailed off sheepishly.

Castiel looked at her, taking in her dark blonde hair tied back and the tired expression on her face. He believed her. Countless others, Uriel included, would call him a fool for trusting someone so obviously a threat, but he could not bring himself to doubt her.

"Yes, it is my Mission," He conceded. " I seek a man who came here when a hymn was playing."

So he was here for Sam and Dean. It was hardly difficult to deduce that. They were her only customers at the moment.

"Will you hurt him?" She questioned warily.

"I will not," Castiel shook his head vehemently. "I wish only to record the moment and deliver it back to my Father."

"Your father…as in _the_ Father?"

Castiel nodded.

"Oh," Merry leant back against the desk as she digested that information. Wings and healing ability aside, she wouldn't exactly be working the Christmas shift if she was a strong believer in God or any other deity for that matter. But the words her Grandma had made her memorise had worked, whatever they meant, so maybe , just maybe…

"I can show you them," She said decisively, as out of the corner of her eye she noticed another light sidle into the parking lot outside. "I assume you don't want to be seen?"

"Did your Grandma's story say that?" Castiel's attention was also directed towards the door, where a pizza delivery boy was tramping his way through the snow with a scowl.

Merry nodded as she opened the door and got a face full of snowflakes in the process.

"Heya Adam," She accepted the pizza and dug some money from the pocket of her jeans. "Happy Hanukkah by the way."

"Thanks," The boy, about the same age as her from what Castiel could gather, shrugged the snow from his shoulders as he accepted the cash. "Us Santa Shift kids have to stick together, huh?"

He extracted a flask from underneath his coat, as Merry smiled and exchanged it for a box with biscuits adoring the cover that she'd rested on the window ledge.

"Till next year Adam," She waved him off as he trudged back towards his car.

"Happy Christmas, Merry," He called back as the door shut again.

Merry turned back towards the angel, clutching her pizza and flask, "Okay, just let me put this soup down and I can show you who you're looking for."

Castiel nodded and as she brushed the remainder of the snow off the pizza he dutifully became invisible.

Merry spun round as she noticed the angel was missing, before remembering the story and sighing in realisation.

"Invisible, right," She murmurs as she heads back down the corridor, pizza in hand. Silently Castiel followed.

After looking behind her to where she assumed the angel was, Merry turned her attention back to door 24 and knocked.

There were a few minutes of shuffling behind the door before it opened, and Merry was bathed in the light of the room. Sam looked down at her, wearing a t-shirt that clearly showed the stitches where his wound used to be.

"Merry, are you alright?" Sam looked at the woman two years younger than him and took in her slightly jaded expression. As he watched she brushed it off with a smile and pushed the pizza into his arms.

"I figured you might be hungry, and I know a guy who does the graveyard shift at Christmas."

"Wow," Sam smiled before turning behind him, " Dean, Merry got pizza."

The man in question sat up from his position on the bed and crossed the room to stand behind Sam. He looked a little dubiously at the pizza, but a subtle elbow in the ribs from his brother made him smile.

"Thank you, that's very kind."

Merry could have sworn she heard a slight gasp from the empty space behind her, and a few seconds later a whispered thank you.

"Well," she felt her cheeks redden with the beginnings of a blush, "That's all I interrupted you for, have a nice evening – or I suppose morning now."

She backed out of the door and was halfway back down the hallway when a voice stopped her.

"Merry Christmas Merry," Sam leant out of the doorway, pizza still in hand.

Merry laughed. "Happy Christmas Sam Winchester."

Behind her, Castiel watched as the door closed on the man he had been sent to find. Dean. Not the name he was necessarily expected, but it sounded right when he said it and that comforted the angel. Perhaps he had completed his mission after all. He had found Dean, and he could return to Heaven with his name in his grasp.

Back at the front desk, Merry was opening the flash when Castiel appeared in front of her.

"Oh," She couldn't even pretend to be surprised now, she was too tired and too much had happened on this fateful Christmas Eve for her to still be surprised by people appearing in her lobby. "I thought you would have gone already."

"Thank you, Merry," The angel stood awkwardly in front of the girl. "My Mission's success is owed to you."

"That's what the Christmas Angel said," Merry put her flask down to stand in front of the angel. Without realising her actions, she stood on tiptoe to straighten the blazer lapels of his suit beneath the cream overcoat. " But it wasn't true. He did it because God had faith in him, and so he succeeded."

Castiel didn't say anything. He couldn't think of the right response to the girl's statement.

Merry stood back and looked at the man with the angel's soul. His suit was rumpled, his coat slightly grubby. She wondered briefly what a man was doing in a suit this late at Christmas, but as she remembered the date she guessed he was probably at some kind of Church thing. They did that quite late didn't they?

"Your vessel, will he remember this?" she asked softly.

"No," Castiel had decided that Jimmy should not remember this night. His gut told him he might need a vessel in the future, and he was equally unsure as to whether it was a part of his Mission to take a vessel. By the lack of training he had previously received for this, he assumed not, and so didn't want them to find out, however juvenile and deceitful that felt.

"Will I ?" Merry's asked quietly, her voice, barely more than a whisper.

 **xXx**

Jimmy Novak had woken to the sound of sirens. He had sat up with a jolt to find himself in the back of an ambulance. The door was open, letting the chill of the night air in. His wife was beside him. She had been crying.

"You're alright," She swept her husband into a hug while he looked around bemusedly. "Thank the Lord you are alright."

"Where's Claire?" He asked as he pressed his face into Amelia's shoulder, glad to be back with her even though he didn't remember ever leaving.

"She's asleep. The neighbours are watching her. I can't believe you are alive Jimmy, they said you should be dead."

He looked up to see his car being lifted from the ditch by a recovery truck. Its front end was crumpled. The airbags deployed.

"I'm alive," He whispered.

"They said it was a miracle," Amelia pressed a kiss to his temple.

"I think it was," Jimmy said quietly. Then, with a slight chuckle. "If we tell Claire she'll say it was Santa miracle."

Amelia chuckled too. " Maybe it was, a Christmas miracle on Christmas eve."

"A Christmas miracle indeed." Jimmy murmured as the paramedic came to check his pulse.

xXx

Castiel flew back towards Heaven. He had ensured his vessel's health, while making sure none of the night's events would remain in his memory. In his grasp was the name of the man who had summoned him to the Pleasant Rest motel room in the early hours of Christmas Day.

Dean Winchester.

Castiel wasn't sure how this man, this name, showed the worth of humanity. That was for the Lord to know, and he supposed for himself and the other angels to find out.

All he knew was that he had completed his Mission, and he was heading home with God's glory on his wings.

xXx

In the lobby of the Pleasant Rest Motel, the first notes of a carol warbled over the radio. As dawn started to creep into between the clouds, Merry sat at her desk and imagined the brothers asleep and full of pizza down the hall. Briefly, she thought of the shadows that had appeared behind the man in the cream coat when he had first appeared in front of her desk. Her eyes lazily traced the outline of wings that had lit up behind him as he had flashed into existence.

She hadn't even asked his name.

Maybe another of her Grandma's stories would come true and tell her.

Maybe it was too late, or too early to think about this.

It was Christmas morning 2006. She was 21. The first words of the carol were playing with her sentimentalities, till indignantly she joined in.

Her voice broke through the silence of the motel, and if she had only sung louder, the streets around it. Down the hall, Sam was roused slightly, before turning over and falling deeper asleep.

" _Silent night, holy night. All is calm, all is bright. Round yon Virgin Mother and Child. Holy Infant so tender and mild. Sleep in heavenly peace. Sleep in heavenly peace"_

 **Thanks for reading and again, Merry Christmas and happy holidays to all.**


End file.
